Travel nurse specialty?

[stevemac]

I'm currently a travel nurse, about half way through a geriatric in-patient psych assignment.

Prior to this, all of my nursing experience (just under 18months) has been ER. ER and psych are my two favorite areas, which is why I accepted this assignment (and it's pretty close to home and they grouped my shifts together so that I get lots of time AT home while on the assignment!)

There's a possibility of extending at the end of this contract...my concern is that I don't want to make myself irrelevant as an ER nurse by spending too much time out of the unit. And, I'm still relatively new as a nurse.

I do like the idea of being able to work in two different specialties, but between the two, ER is home.

Any travelers--or hiring managers--with thoughts on this?

[Silverdragon102, BSN]

Moved to the Travel Nursing forum

[stevemac]

Thanks! I didn't know there was one!

[Argo]

I think you should move on and take an ER contract now. Your experience will become irrelevant to the hospital looking for travelers. While you may still feel and be up to date with being in the ER, they will take someone that has been doing the assignments in ER vs someone who has not been doing them.

One caveat is that ER is a fairly high demand market so they are hungry for nurses right now. That could chance over night though..

[NedRN]

ED is way bigger than psych with more opportunities. So that is a slam dunk to focus on that specialty since you like it better. However, I see little harm in taking say one psych assignment a year if you love it. It may even enhance your chances at some ED assignments and should not be harmful. One psych assignment a year will keep your experience current (in the eyes of hiring managers) and competitive for another psych assignment the next year.